Giuls and I have been discussing how to limit the amount of time it takes to clean one’s apartment. We love a good, productive cleaning sesh, but it seems like we’re spending way too much time cleaning during the week. How do you live a cleaner life while simultaneously cutting back on the amount of time spent cleaning? I don’t think you’ve got to get rid of a bunch of shit to live a tidier life. I’m never going to downsize my shoe collection and I will forever be a cosmetic junkie. How, then, does one live a tidier life without completely overhauling and Marie Kondo-ing the shit out of their apartment? We found that there were three fundamental truths to living a cleaner life. Gird your loins.

#1: ALWAYS BE TIDYING

I know, I know, this seems rull counterintuitive to the overall goal of cleaning less, but it’s nevertheless effective. ABT, or ALWAYS BE TIDYING, will change your life. ‘Always be Tidying’ is the principle of always putting away what you’ve most recently taken out. That means not letting the dishes pile up, hanging up the first two outfits you tried on this morning, and not leaving your towel on the bed. By ’always be tidying’, you’re eliminating the amount of labor- and mentally-intensive clean-up that has to happen at a later date. Not to mention, your environment is hella more serene in the present moment. As Joan Crawford simply put, “Never leave one room without something for another.”

#2: STREAMLINE YA SYSTEM

Now that you’re in the habit of tidying up regularly, you’re ready to move onto the next step: SYS, or STREAMLINE YA SYSTEM. By STREAMLINING YA SYSTEM, you’re reducing the amount of time you have to spend putting shit away in an inconvenient AF location. Do your clothes pile up in the bathroom? Get a hamper and stick it in there. Do you have a hard time putting dishes away? Buy a dish rack that works for your needs. Make it EASIER to be tidier. To STREAMLINE MA SYSTEM, for example, I bought a divided laundry hamper so that my clothes are immediately sorted. Boom. A third of the work is already done.

#3: THROWOUT SOME STUFF

Ha! You thought I was going to tell you that you could keep everything, right? WRONG! You should definitely get rid of some stuff and you should do it frequently. If you find you’re holding onto physical records or tech boxes, sign up for LastPass and take pictures of barcodes, serial codes, etc. These documents are highly secured and available wherever and whenever you may need to access them. On another note, if something no longer works for you, don’t work for it; that organization system that isn’t big enough or doesn’t fit your changed needs? Let it go! STREAMLINE YA SYSTEM and get a better system that works for you!

Giuls and I used to believe that we could either do something wholeheartedly or not at all. We didn’t like biting off one slice without committing to the whole pie, and we realized that said a lot about our perfectionist natures. There IS a happy medium and it is sort of manic to downshift from one extreme to the other. Be mindful of these tendencies that, while they may masquerade as productive, “good” habits, these habits sabotage small progress in the meantime.

With all that being said, though, if you’re dead set on a deep, absolute zero sort of clean, I have one tip for you: start in the recesses of your closet. pull everything out and reorganize because 1) you’ll have more space to put away things later, 2) you’ll find stuff you’ve been missing or realize that you haven’t missed other things at all, and 3) It’s a small area and completing something will give you a feeling of accomplishment. Start in your closet and work your way out from there.

The important thing to remember, though, is that we’re trying to eliminate the amount of time we spend cleaning and the labor that it entails. By procrastinating until it’s time to dedicate hours and hours of your time and mental energy to cleaning, you’re enforcing your perfectionist tendencies to bounce from one extreme to another. To get to the point where cleaning doesn’t feel particularly laborious, you’ve got to chip away at it a little bit all the time and concentrate on what you most recently used. If your place is ‘tidy,’ then cleaning it will be just that: spraying counters, swapping out linens. It WON’T be an exhausting, day-long process that sucks up half your weekend.

We’re all about finding the most efficient ways to get the job done! What are your tried and true methods? Email us to be featured in an updated post!